The Italian Job : Robbed in San Remo

We spent our first afternoon back in Italy driving as Lake Maggiore was shrouded in cloud.  We got stuck doing 20 km/h behind a tractor carrying two cows.  It had what we assumed was a support vehicle behind it, which basically tailgated the tractor.  This meant that anyone who wanted to pass had to pass both vehicles (impossible), on roads which were full of blind corners.  At one point they both pulled over to let dozens of cars pass.  We did too so that we wouldn't be the front of the huge queue.  However before the queue of cars had passed, to our dismay the tractor and his friend pulled back into traffic again!  We finally passed them many kms down the  road when we finally had a short straight, giving them a frustrated toot as we passed.  We aren't sure how far this tractor was going, but at that speed and over such a long distance, we thought it was a pretty inconsiderate and dangerous way to transport stock.  We stopped at an Aire in the quaint town of Mergozzo for the night.

We walked through the town to the lake the following morning.  The rain had decided to take a break and there wasn't a tourist to be seen.  We drove south during the afternoon using the toll road.  We exited early to go to the supermarket, and then continued down to a town called Casella.  We were considering using it as a spot for catching the train to Genova.  The rain continued to come down, and that night we had the heaviest rain we'd had in a while.  The train ride to Genova, is supposed to be very nice through the hills with some great scenery.  In the morning, a combination of rain and being unsure about the safety of the car park, made us decide not to go into Genova.  We continued down to the coast, and thought that we might catch a train from a different town once there.

The drive down to the coast (through Genova, not advised now I know why) was manic.  It was made all the worse by vehicles double parking, busy roads and lots of pedestrians.  Dale did very well to drive through the chaos.  It's no wonder that so many cars we see have dings and scratches.  We also saw the aftermath of what looked like a head on collision on a two-laned one way road (make of that what you will).  That day we considered two other towns to catch the train from to get to Genova, but discounted both.  It was mid afternoon and we wanted to continue further along the coast and not wait around to visit Genova the next day.  What we had seen so far of the Italian Rivera hadn't impressed me, so I was happy to keep driving.  We found a gem of a town called Noli.  It was on the coast, and had a castle perched on the hill top.  We parked in the town and walked up a track that we believed would led us to the castle.  We got some great views of the town below, but it led us to a crematoria (which was very nice).  Thinking we couldn't reach the castle this way we turned back and walked along the road, and found a sign for the castle.  It was a walking track for the first half of the climb, and along the road for the second.  Not ideal, but we made it up to the top.  Unfortunately, there was construction work going on around the castle, so we weren't able to go in.  From the castle, we could see the crematoria however.  We continued walking toward it, finding out that the two paths did link up, we had been so close, ...oops.  We finished by walking along the waterfront back to the van.

The following morning we checked out the town again, seeing 3 churches, a town gate and walls.  Again it looked like we were in for another rainy day.  I believe it has rained almost every day here for the last 2 weeks.  Now we were on the coast it was also very humid, so at least it wasn't cold as well.  At lunch time we stopped in Andora for our first Italian pizza.  The first pizzeria we tried only served pasta for lunch.  Whilst it looked lovely, we were really after pizza as we had been having lots of fresh pasta for dinners in the van.  The next restaurant we tried wasn't as busy, but was serving pizza, and we really enjoyed it.  That afternoon we stopped in Imperia to go to the Olive museum.  Our downloaded guidebook said it was free, but guide is about 8 years old, so were just hoping really.  We eventually found a park, and paid for one hour as we were unsure about what time we would need.  We arrived at the museum at 2.50pm, and saw it reopened at 3pm, so we waited.  A few other tourists joined us, and by 3.15pm the gates still hadn't opened.  We had seen a subway/underpass entrance to the museum site from the factory across the road.  So we went to investigate and popped up on the other side just has they opened the gates. Apparently there was a fault.  We would have been appreciated if a staff member came outside to tell us this 15 minutes earlier!  The museum turned out to now be 5 euro each, so with 30mins left on our parking we decided to skip it. The German tourists also waiting at the gate also left, they had been informed at the tourist information that it was free (so don't know what's going on there).  It started raining again! so we spent our remaining time walking to the marina and admiring some expensive super yachts. Some of the crews were on-board working and most had the full works uniforms in colours matching the boats and logos.

HERE IS THE IMPORTANT STORY AND THE REASON FOR THE LACK OF PHOTOS AND LONG DELAY IN POSTING.

Nicky: The following day proved to be our worst on our trip so far as we were broken into again.  If I was reading this blog, I would be thinking, what is wrong with us?  One of the words that sums up how I feel is embarrassed.  I can believe this has happened again!
We parked in a main waterfront car park in San Remo at 10.55am, paying for one hour.  We only wanted to have a brief look at the casino and old town.  Dale paid the parking and I got our backpack ready.  I packed our computer, passports, my prescription glasses and the GPS (we have taken to carrying these essentials when we leave the van).  My fatal mistake was not including Dale's camera.  It was in his rainjacket from the day before, and as it was the first sunny day in ages I didn't pack the rain jackets.  I of course didn't realise the camera was in there.  So we locked up and I did what we call our 'perimeter check'.  This involves walking around the van checking all doors and windows are locked.  They were.  We returned an hour later.  The front passenger quarter-light had been smashed, they then wound the window down, cut the belt we have tied between the two doors, and they were in (fortunately some of our hidden things they missed).  They pulled out the radio, took our computer charger, mouse and wifi booster, 3 pairs of jeans, several pairs of shoes (including my high heels and purse bought for Mark and Dana's wedding), a box of sovenirs (totalling about only 20-30 euros worth, but had sentimental value to us), food (including a block of cheese from the fridge) and unfortunately our rain jackets (with the camera).  When we returned to the van, two parking wardens were nearby.  They told us that they had been past our vehicle about half an hour ago and seen the window down (probably dopey bugger didn't see the smashed window next to it).  This immediately upset me (Nicky) as I thought I must have left it open.  Later I went over and over it again in my head, and I think the parking warden must have been past after the theft.  So off we went to the Police station after we had been through everything and tried to figure what was gone.  What hurt the most was Dale's camera being taken (several days photos gone again). Most of the clothes and shoes were of low value and some very worn.  The Police station was on a narrow road with no parking, so as Dale stopped by the gate an officer said to go back on the road and take the first right.  We stopped by some houses and businesses, not even sure if this was the correct place but someone had to stay with the van anyway, so it didn't matter.

Dale came back with Police report in hand.  He said the officers wanted to know if he had insurance, and didn't seem to keen to do a Police report if he didn't.  Now forgive me, but I can only assume that the officer did the paperwork primarily so we could use it for an insurance claim and not for reporting the crime.  This in itself makes me sick.  These vehicle robberies are the perfect crime for these thugs.  Low risk and high reward, with the Police seemingly turning a blind eye.  I saw a Police car do a lap of the car park when Dale was paying for parking.  If they had half a conscience, would they not think to stop and warn us

Dale:  So now we had the problem of the smashed window.  It was a little tricky getting to a garage but once we did we were directed to a panelbeater.  Due to dicey directions we ended up driving right past and up to the top of the hill where we were directed back down again.  Totally in Italian the man conveyed that he wouldn't be able to order the glass, so couldn't help us and that our most likely replacement would be from a wreckers.  We continued on not sure exactly what to do but saw a sign with Fiat on it and from this garage were recommended a glass company very close to where we had stayed the previous night.  So back we went which turned out to be good because one of the staff there called Christian had lived in Birmingham for 3 years, and spoke English which was a good start.  After initial confidence that they could do it, when they rang for the glass they began to realise it was a very hard part to find.  We were wanting to replace the computer plug and mouse, so Christian drove his car and we followed him to Euronics.  He was very sympathetic and genuinely sorry about our situation, and a bit negative about Italy as a country!  So 45 euros later and some of the computer gear was replaced, and we headed to the spot we had used the night before.  There are several other Italian motorhomes there, most staying a long time. So the glass guys said they would ring us the next day (Friday), as it was I rang them mid afternoon and they had no progress, so we had to wait the weekend out.

Then on Monday we went back to have a conversation and we discussed options and Christian helped out by calling the 2 wreckers yards within 45mins drive (they really don't do wreckers as much as in NZ or UK according to Christian), it wasn't looking promising so we decided to go ahead and have them put in a piece of plexiglass as a temporary measure.  Maybe an hour after this was finished Christian called us and it turned out one of the wreckers might have one but we had to get out there to check and the best we could manage for directions was the town name it was near.  So we drove out there and started asking, after about 4 people trying to give us directions in Italian we got a little English and found it (it was down a very steep narrow road I never would have entered if I didn't have to).  Sure enough the window he had was right, excellent.  So I pushed my luck and pointed to my badly rusted drivers door and they went off and came back with a door with glass and wing mirror all in good condition. I had to have it (price was right by UK standards don't know about Italian). Also a guy, probably late 20's, Simone had turned up to wreck his old car and he spoke English, so he did a little translating and for his trouble we gave him a ride home. He was leaving his old car you see so he would have had a long walk and it is very hilly here and often there are no footpaths on very narrow roads.  So back to the glass guys just in time for them to fit the window before knocking off time.

So now we have a door to deal with so another night back with the Italian campers and the next day we got a mechanic to fit the new door. We had to wait till 3pm to get the door done and it was a bit of an ordeal.  First they put the youngest guy on it (wasn't really that young) and he seemed to be make heavy work of it quite unsure of things at times.  Anyway after about 25 minutes he had to go (breakdown recovery I think) and an older guy that had been assisting took over.  This turned out to be much more stressful as he seemed to have a very short fuse and spent most of the time muttering, cursing and throwing his light around.  Another guy turned up and he seemed calm which was good and he helped get the lock changed over.  However they were still having trouble as the door wasn't quite hanging right so there were some tense moments as some brute force 'adjustments' were made so the door could close correctly.  It had taken longer than we had hoped and on that evenings drive west it got dark and became very difficult to drive that evening but at least we were going again.